Taking a Creative LEAP!

Creative seeds we plant . . .

This year February 29th is a special LEAP year for me because it’s the threshold of a big creative leap. Tomorrow, The Soul Discovery Coloring Book, Noodling, Doodling and Scribbling Your Way to an Extraordinary Life, is available online and in bookstores.

When my co-creator and the book’s author, Janet Conner, approached me last spring about collaborating on a coloring (spelling intentional here – Janet is American) book, I leapt at the opportunity. Janet is the author of five other books, and so for her, adding another is part of her life’s work. However, I don’t think either of us anticipated what would happen as a result of our collaboration on her sixth book.

The book’s creation is a reminder to cry—YES—when an unexpected seed flowers in your life, and to leap.

When I joined one of Janet’s online classes in the summer of 2014 I had no idea it was the first of many little seeds which would become the book’s creation story. I immediately enjoyed Janet’s class. The beautiful, deep content, combined with live weekly calls with Janet, and the circle of beautiful souls gathered there was very healing. During the calls I would sit in my backyard and doodle. Because the doodles began to echo some of the things being expressed by others on the calls I posted them on the private Facebook page Janet sets up for each of her classes. It was one of my posted drawings that Janet asked if she could include in a proposal she was sending to her publisher. To be honest, I wasn’t sure what, if anything, would come of it. I was pretty surprised, and excited, and also scared, when she got back to me almost immediately to say we had a 3-month deadline—and—pretty much carte blanche to create the format we wanted!

What emerged from the seeds Janet and I planted in our lives, was an extraordinary journey into the imaginal realm to create a book which takes our readers on their own imaginal journey.

We’re a great team. Janet with her love of words, and me, with my joy at the language of the visual. Our collaboration was like a smooth and polished dance routine. We spent hours and hours working, then came together on Skype to move seamlessly onto the next idea, the next chapter, the next images of the book. Each of us knew when to lead and when to follow. We laughed and we cried. We had so many AHA’s, I know we’ve both lost count. Our collaboration was filled with much love and respect. I know that comes through in our book. I think what we have created is something unique and beautiful—and I’m very grateful for the experience.

Our book, of course, is not just a colouring book, it’s much more . . .

I think the easy flow creating the book happened because it was always our intention to invite our future readers to create in new ways and find new pathways for their creative heARTs.

Janet invites our readers to ponder deep questions on their imaginal journey. The Soul Discovery Coloring Book is structured around 22 key questions to ignite the imagination. Janet invites readers to soul write. She explains soul-writing this way, “If you want to engage in a vibrant conversation with the wisdom that dwells just a hair below your conscious awareness, write. Write every day, at approximately the same time, with passion, honesty, and the intention of speaking with and listening to the voice within.”

I invite readers to make heART art. It’s an invitation to embrace your child’s view of creating and let go of your adult judgement of what art should be. There are 22 creative prompts and colouring pages, which act as, “. . . powerful catalysts to accessing the knowledge already deep within you.”

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